


I am Iron Man

by cazmalfoy



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Compliant, Avengers: Endgame (Movie) Spoilers, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-04
Updated: 2019-05-04
Packaged: 2020-02-23 20:48:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,198
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18709711
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cazmalfoy/pseuds/cazmalfoy
Summary: CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR AVENGERS ENDGAME.Summary and full tags are in the author's note.





	I am Iron Man

**Author's Note:**

> Summary: The crate was found six weeks after Tony's funeral...
> 
> Tags: Major character death. Passing on the Mantle. Tony as Harley's father figure.
> 
> As much as I hated the end of Endgame, and as far as I'm concerned, it and Infinity War never happened, I haven't been able to get this out of my head. This is compliant with the ending and everything that means for the fandom, so please proceed with caution (and possibly tissues).

It was six weeks after the funeral they found it.

None of them had been expecting it, but no one could say they were surprised. One thing about Tony Stark was that he had been unwavering in his insistence that people were inherently good.

Pepper had been the one to find it. Locked away in the basement of their house near the lake. Tony had sworn he had left the superhero life behind, but neither of them had believed him. Pepper had just let him keep the illusion that he had left Iron Man in his past.

There had been a letter attached to the case, but Pepper hadn’t opened it. It hadn’t been addressed to her.

With Harley still in town, claiming that he wanted to make sure Pepper and Morgan were handling the transition as well as they could even though they had all seen through his lies, Pepper had wasted no time in showing him what Tony had left behind.

“This is yours,” Pepper had whispered, patting Harley on the shoulder before leaving him alone to open the case in private.

Harley slowly wiped the thick layer of dust off to reveal the logo for Stark Industries printed on the top. It had been a long time since he had seen it; the company having been sold off to various others when half their board of directors had disappeared in the middle of a negotiation meeting. Seeing it now, brought back a fresh wave of emotion and thoughts of how unfair it was that Tony wasn’t around to bring his company back from the dead.

With a deep breath and fingers that were shaking more than Tony had during his panic attacks the first time they met, Harley tore open the envelope Tony had left for him.

_Kid._

_I know this letter is_ incredibly _old school, and you’re already rolling your eyes at me, but give me a chance and let your old man talk. I was going to start this with, ‘if you’re reading this, I must be dead’ but that seemed too callous even for me. Besides, I’m planning on giving what’s in this box to you at some point anyway. I just have to make sure we’re both ready first._

_Anyway, as cliché as it sounds, if you’re reading this letter, then the inevitable has happened; there’s no way I’d be able to suffer the embarrassment of spilling my heart out if I wasn’t dead._

_Obviously, I don’t know what’s happened to me; I can’t see the future. But I know I’ve had a good run. By rights, I should have died in 2008, alone in a cave in Afghanistan. For whatever reason, someone decided to let me live and I’ve been punishing them for that decision ever since._

_I thought my time was up on Titan, and I suppose in a way it was. You know how much we lost that day; everyone lost someone in the Snap. Your mom would be proud of the young man you’ve grown into, even though she isn’t around to see it. Our entire worlds fell apart, but we managed to find ourselves again; we didn’t have a choice._

_That’s why I built the suit for you. The world is still trying to rebuild, and there’s no room for old would-be heroes like me and Cap, even if he doesn’t want to admit it. I know you’ve heard some of the fights we’ve had over the last few years. You’re not as good at eavesdropping as you think you are._

_Just because the world’s population has been halved doesn’t mean crime has. The world will always need the Avengers, and it’s time for the next generation to take over, Harley._

_Obviously, I’m going to force you to take the suit; hell, like I said, I’m likely not even there to show you it in person. But I honestly believe you should. You have everything it takes to be a superhero. Certainly, more than I ever did, that’s for sure. What other eleven-year-old kid is brave enough to face off against an intruder with a crappy potato gun?_

_I love you, kid. I know I’ve never said that to you, but it’s true. You wormed your way into my mechanical heart with a Dora the Explorer watch and even more sass than Pepper._

_Take care of Robin, Morgan and Pepper for me okay? Happy is great and everything, but he’s going to need all the help he can get. You’re the man of the house now, Harls. You_ are _Iron Man. Just remember that._

_Make us all proud._

_Love, the Mechanic xx_

Tears were freely rolling down Harley’s cheeks as he finished reading the letter, but he didn’t try to hide them. There was no one in the basement to judge him, and after what they had all just been through, he was pretty sure there wasn’t a person on the planet who would think any less of him.

Tony was right. The snap had been brutal for them all. Not least for Tony, who had been stranded in space for almost a month, and had been forced to witness his young prodigy, Spider-Man, disintegrating before his eyes. But Tony had never used his personal suffering as leverage over any of them.

As he said, they’d all lost at least one person in the snap. Pepper’s aunt had lost her husband that day. Harley and Robin’s mom had disappeared on her way to work, causing her car to crash into a tree and be totalled.

With Tony’s selfless sacrifice, they had all been returned but it wasn’t the same. Everyone who had returned was trying to play catch up on five years, while their loved ones were trying to readjust as well. They’d all had to learn to cope without people in their lives, and suddenly they were back.

Harley drew a deep breath and ran a hand over his cheek, drying his tears as he reached for the clasps on the crate Tony had left.

Inside the box, nestled in sturdy black foam, was a familiar looking faceplate. A face plate that Harley hadn’t seen for a long time outside of his memories of life before the snap, and old photographs. The only thing that was different was the colour.

Where there had once been red and gold, now shone dark blue, purple and silver. Harley’s favourite colours and something he didn’t even remember telling Tony.

Before, his hands had been shaking, but now they were sure as he lifted the mask up and put it on. It fit perfectly. This wasn’t an Iron Man mask that had been repurposed and given a fresh coat of paint. This had been made with his measurements in mind. Tony had never planned to give this to anyone else.

As soon as the mask was on his face, the visual display of the HUD lit up immediately with scans of the room around him.

“Hello, Master Keener,” a familiar voice echoed in his ears, making Harley jump in alarm.

“JARVIS?” he found himself asking in confusion. There was no way JARVIS could be talking to him; Ultron had destroyed him years ago and Tony had switched to FRIDAY, who was still in operation around the property now.

“Indeed, Sir,” the clipped British accent replied. Before Harley could question how it was possible, JARVIS answered for him, “Mr Stark managed to recover most of my coding after Thanos’s attack on the Vision and, while I am not as I once was, he was able to develop me to become more than the basic code I was originally designed to be.”

Harley couldn’t stop a smile spreading across his face. He had enjoyed helping Tony fix JARVIS after they had broken into his garage and had been extremely upset to learn that the AI was no more. To know that Tony had rebuilt him with Harley in mind, made the young man feel even closer to the genius.

He turned his head, scanning the room and trying to take in everything he could see in front of his face. Having that much information so close to his eyes was going to take some getting used to, but Harley was certain he could do it. Tony had believed in him, so he had to; there was no other option.

Out of the corner of his eye, Harley sensed movement and he ripped the mask off quickly, feeling like a kid who had just been caught with his hand in the cookie jar.

Standing on the bottom step, Peter Parker was looking at him with an unreadable expression.

Neither spoke for a long moment. Before the funeral, Harley had never met the web-slinger; he had been dusted long before Harley and Robin had moved closer to the Starks’s. But he had heard stories from Tony – most of them on the anniversary on the dusting when everyone had been drinking too much and morosely reminiscing. It had been the only time Tony had allowed himself to indulge in what had once been a habit.

Harley was the first to break the silence. “I…” He didn’t know where he had been planning on taking the sentence, but he didn’t need to.

Peter stepped down into the basement proper and took a step closer. “It suits you,” he said softly, indicating to the mask still in Harley’s hands. It was weird, seeing Peter like this, Harley thought. All the stories people had told about Peter had mentioned his immeasurable enthusiasm and energy.

But, Harley reasoned with himself, very few of them had things to be enthusiastic about nowadays.

Harley glanced down at the mask in his hands. It didn’t weigh much – he knew Tony had long since refined the design to make it lightweight – but the responsibility that came with it made Harley feel like he was holding a concrete block.

“He wants me to pick up where he left off,” Harley confessed softly. He knew that he didn’t know Peter at all, but something in him needed to talk to someone who could understand what Tony was asking of him from beyond the grave.

Peter hummed thoughtfully and nodded his head, but he didn’t speak.

Harley drew a breath and whispered what was running through his head that he didn’t want to admit that he had almost been afraid to think up to that point. “I don’t think I can live up to everything he was.”

When Peter spoke in response to his words, his voice was still quiet and reserved. “You can’t,” he agreed, making Harley look at him in surprise. “No one can. But he’s not asking you to. Mr Stark… He doesn’t want you to be _his_ version of Iron Man. He wants you to be your own superhero.”

Harley couldn’t help scoffing a little and Peter threw him an exasperated look. “Mr Stark saved my life once, you know?” he commented. “Well, he saved my life loads, but I meant before we even officially met. At the first New Stark Expo I was face to face with one of the scariest robots imaginable and, like an idiot, I raised my Iron Man gauntlet to fire at the bad guy instead of running away. Then, suddenly… it worked.”

Peter cracked a smile at the memory, although Harley noticed it was tinged with a little sadness. “Of course, it was Mr Stark all along, but I spent _years_ thinking I had superpowers.”

Despite wanting to keep a stoic façade, Harley couldn’t help the corners of his lips twitching upward at Peter’s words.

“My point is,” continued Peter, clearly forcing himself to get back on track, “Mr Stark was my favourite superhero before then, but he’s been my role model ever since.” Tears formed in the corners of Peter’s eyes, but he either didn’t notice or was comfortable enough to cry in front of someone he barely knew.

“Maybe there’s a little kid out there who needs still needs Iron Man to save them?” Peter suggested with a smile that was marginally more hopeful than it was sad.

Harley’s breath caught in his throat at the suggestion. He almost didn’t dare to entertain the idea, but Peter’s words struck a chord in the back of Harley’s mind.

Instead of waiting for Harley to speak, Peter jerked his head over his shoulder, indicating up the stairs. “Pepper told me to tell you that dinner’s ready,” he said, explaining without prompting why he had interrupted Harley. “Just… Whatever you decide, make sure you think about it properly okay?”

Harley nodded slowly as he placed the helmet back in the box and closed the clasps tightly. Wordlessly, he indicated for Peter to lead the way, which he did without hesitation.

Halfway up the stairs, Harley paused and glanced back down at the box Tony had left for him. It looked so unsuspecting; like it wouldn’t change everything about Harley’s life if he let it.

He knew before he’d even reached the top of the stairs that he was going to carry on Tony’s legacy.

Harley was going to become Iron Man and make his father proud.


End file.
